Electrical cables, and in particular underwater electrical cables, are manufactured and delivered in very long single-piece lengths. They are then stored in tanks which may be on the deck or in the hold of a cable-laying ship.
The winding machines mounted in the centers of such cable ship tanks have a major drawback in that they are permanently mounted in the center of the tank. While the cables are being, uncoiled from the tanks, the winding machines get in the way and may even damage the cable.
Preferred embodiments of the present invention remedy this drawback by proposing a transportable winding machine which need not be taken on voyage, and which thus need not get in the way of cable uncoiling operations. Another advantage of preferred transportable coiling-down machines in accordance with the invention is that they are small enough to be transported by road within the usual loading guages.